“This is about artists transforming the world … making it better,” said Helen Marriage before one of Europe’s most important light art festivals. “It’s about creating a living art gallery that is accepted by everybody and welcomed by everybody and somehow brings a sense of communal joy and pleasure.”
Marriage was speaking in front of remarkable and mesmerising three-dimensional geometric projections on to Durham Cathedral and other buildings in the city’s historic Palace Green.
The work, by Spanish artist Javier Riera, is one of 40 works lighting up Durham for its biennial Lumiere festival, expected to be visited by tens of thousands of visitors over four nights from Thursday.
Riera’s work is one of the biggest in size, transforming Unesco world heritage site architecture in what the artist said was a respectful way. “I wanted to create a calm environment and at the same time… a wow,” he said.
Inside the cathedral is another immense work consisting of 4,000 light bulbs, each activated by the heartbeats of anyone who wants to interact with it.
Nearby in the 11th-century Chapter House is Ai Weiwei’s blazingly bright Illuminated Bottle Rack consisting of 61 carefully placed antique chandeliers.
“There are some phenomenally important graves underneath here so the permissions process alone has been my life’s work,” joked producer Eloise Markwell-Butler.
There are works positioned on bridges and buildings and in spaces all over the city by artists from 15 different countries.
The free festival has been staged every two years in Durham since 2009 and has been visited by more than a million people. Its 2023 programme is the biggest yet.
Lumiere is arguably the most important contemporary light art festival in Europe and people in Durham are very attached to it.
“We are absolutely proud,” said county council leader Amanda Hopgood. “We own it. Lumiere is ours. It puts us not just on a national stage but an international stage, which is marvellous.”
It has also brought in an extra £37m to the economy, she said.
The event is produced by the arts company Artichoke, which Marriage is co-founder and director of. It’s fun and an opportunity for a zillion photographs but there’s a seriousness to it, she said.
“We are a contemporary art exhibition, we’re not a Christmas light trail and we work from artists all over the world as well as people locally to create artworks that transform the public realm and I hope, transform how people feel about it, how they feel about being out and about and being together.
“Our mission is always to try to interrupt daily life with the work of amazing artists so that no-one feels excluded.”
Light artworks from the festivals regularly become permanent installations in Durham, with the latest being Lampounette (2021) by French studio Tilt, a giant desk lamp that lights up an area around Pennyferry Bridge.
“It replaced a street light,” said Marriage. “Wouldn’t the world be better if it was full of these and not street lights? It looks like it has always been here … everyone who walks past, smiles.